Pregnant Teen Shot Dead, Her One And A Half Pound Baby Survives

Eva CasaraScreenshot via The Chicago TribuneA Dolton teenager and his brother are charged with first-degree murder in the shooting death of the teen's pregnant 17-year-old girlfriend Christmas Day in Dolton, authorities said late Saturday.

Eva Casara, 17, was found slumped over in the snow Christmas evening, bleeding from a single gunshot in the back of her head, police said. She was pronounced dead just before 11 a.m. Thursday at Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn, authorities said. She was 22 to 25 weeks pregnant at the time, and doctors were able to save the baby.

Anthony Lee, 16, and his brother Diante Coakley, 21, both of Dolton, are charged with first-degree murder, said Dolton police Chief John Franklin.

Casara was unintentionally struck when the brothers started shooting during a botched drug deal, Franklin said.

Authorities are obtaining an arrest warrant for a third suspect, Franklin said. Lee and Coakley are expected to appear in bond court Sunday.

Casara's grandmother stood by her hospital bed hours after she was found, urging her to fight for the life of her unborn daughter.

"You fight hard to save this little tiny baby," Fannie Casara, 63, remembers telling her granddaughter, who lived in the Chicago Lawn neighborhood on the South Side. "I'll do everything in my power to help raise your baby."

Casara's newborn child weighed about a pound and half and was named "Baby Doe" for the time being, Fannie Casara said. Her name will be Lailani Paris Casara, the name her mother recently chose when she learned she was carrying a girl, relatives said.

"We're taking it hour by hour, day by day," Fannie Casara said.

Dolton police found Eva Casara around 8 p.m. Wednesday, her body lying between two homes in the 1100 block of East 152nd Street in Dolton. She was taken to St. Margaret Health in Hammond and later to Christ Medical Center.

Police believe she had been shot in the 15200 block of Dorchester Avenue in Dolton and her body was later moved to the site where she was found.

"She was alive but in very grave condition," said Chief Franklin.

Casara's grandmother didn't say where the victim was going or offer any theories about the crime.

"I don't want to speculate," Fannie Casara said.

She said Eva Casara was working on getting her GED certificate and planned to go to a community college to make a better life for her daughter.

"She was a smart, beautiful young lady," said Angela Casara, the victim's cousin. "She was excited when she learned she was having a girl."

Fannie Casara said she raised Eva Casara since infancy and hopes to care for the newborn as well.

"She looks just like her mother," Fannie Casara said. "She's beautiful, and she's so tiny, all those tiny fingers and toes."